The last leg of the year

Three more days till the end of term.

There's been so much work the past month; the pace of term now seems radically different compared to the first half. I never drank coffee; now I take a cup every day. I've not seen much more of Boston, and eat microwave dinners half the time.

Just one more exam on Tuesday, and then we break for winter.

The Harvard Medical School campus is huge; like a tumour that's metastasized out of control. One professor described it as a medico-industrial complex. Several full-service hospitals, plus numerous specialized institutes and the medical school proper; it's larger than the main Harvard campus at Cambridge, MA. I'm doing my next rotation there; it's an interesting glimpse into the life there, as compared to where I am now: a hospital/research institution versus traditional university-based lifestyle.

Winter's coming too. The weather has been as impetuous as in the UK; someone mentioned that the New England climate must be a female. 2 weeks ago it was below freezing, and everyone was sure that was the start of winter. First snow a week ago; powder snow that just drifted around like sand, not the wet snow of England. Shows how cold it can get. But this week's really warm, as if spring was coming. Change of temperature's like the hot flashes of a menopausal 50 year-old. It'll cool down soon enough though.

Caught the Geminid meteor shower a few days ago too. Supposedly the most spectacular of the yearly showers, which sadly before always seemed to be best viewed from the states. Caught 5 in 20 mins, which I guess wasn't as frequent as I imagined....and it's hard to wish for anything in the space of half a second...

Still...